SparkFun Electronics Commentsurn:uuid:214d0e4e-f1b1-d287-ce26-ac5b4c9f82492015-03-31T12:06:56-06:00SparkFun ElectronicsMayo2017 on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleMayo2017urn:uuid:e15c1598-5e4f-f768-1638-f41a54302b502014-05-23T10:20:08-06:00<p>Water-soluble fluxes are highly aggressive and will corrode boards if left uncleaned. This can be a real problem in some cases where it gets under things like BGAs especially.</p>Mayo2017 on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleMayo2017urn:uuid:62363602-cf3a-a7cb-8af4-93425ef329892014-05-23T10:18:49-06:00<p>Here&rsquo;s another vote for the Kester 951. I can&rsquo;t live without the damn stuff.</p>Snobbotics on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleSnobboticsurn:uuid:2acf5a29-41eb-d506-a9f8-41eb92dd72de2014-02-20T19:06:13-07:00<p>I absolutely love this pen. Too bad I can&rsquo;t buy it from SFE, but I just found it at Allied Electronics: http://www.alliedelec.com/search/productdetail.aspx?SKU=70177953</p>
<p>If you guys buy all of them before I can place my order, may the back-EMF of 1000 motors attack your motor controllers!</p>RedHeron on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleRedHeronurn:uuid:229f67e3-8649-b529-4788-97b5f4ca6d842014-02-10T08:52:33-07:00<p>What hazards are with this pen? It&rsquo;s the one I&rsquo;ve been told by basically everyone is the best. It&rsquo;s flux, so the purpose of it is chemical in nature.</p>
<p>Kester also has a <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Kester-951-Soldering-Low-Solids-No-Clean/dp/B004X4KOWS/ref=pd_sxp_f_pt" rel="nofollow" >no-clean pen</a> which I&rsquo;ve also been told about (I&rsquo;m hanging with some electrical engineers). It&rsquo;s more expensive, but certainly less chemical-y. And Amazon ships it, so you might be able to set up fulfillment by Amazon and avoid other shipping issues (it&rsquo;s a workaround, but it might work). I&rsquo;m sure that Kester might be willing to work on it with you, as well, since SparkFun does volume.</p>
<p>Just some ideas.</p>Shadow6363 on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleShadow6363urn:uuid:b84f7b62-68f3-5eab-26d1-1f2f9e8258cb2014-01-21T20:52:28-07:00<p>So…what was the danger with this? I&rsquo;ve been using it for over a year now and am wondering if I&rsquo;m going to suddenly pass out and die or something the next time I use it.</p>schwal on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water Solubleschwalurn:uuid:1a8d829c-85df-0c3e-68a3-429e9529e9412014-01-18T11:46:44-07:00<p>If you are in the Boulder area and hurting for flux pens, JB Saunders finally has some back in stock.</p>LightManCA on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleLightManCAurn:uuid:e1ba5f44-1b0c-5431-6e80-0e88b1047ee72013-11-15T10:32:58-07:00<p>Glad I bought this while it could still be shipped. And thanks Asuraku for the suggestion of kimwipes. I&rsquo;m gonna get some right now.</p>Customer #326474 on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleCustomer #326474urn:uuid:ee304109-b9df-172d-9d45-4d48f7896dfd2013-09-03T20:00:24-06:00<p>Agreed! :D</p>Customer #326474 on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleCustomer #326474urn:uuid:1260c8e7-5f45-27f7-ef78-f0f2033c158f2013-09-03T20:00:05-06:00<p>Why did you lick the pen&hellip;?</p>TFlock on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleTFlockurn:uuid:78d4009b-1c4c-66d5-5dc9-6c8239ba0a552013-09-03T16:58:52-06:00<p>No! I need more flux, I&rsquo;m sure it is safe&hellip; enough.</p>ulidtko on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water Solubleulidtkourn:uuid:47a5aaf6-a65b-a880-cdc8-8355452021012013-05-31T04:08:30-06:00<p>Not shown on the photos, but the pen has hard porous tip, with very usable push-doser and holder. It&rsquo;s so cool, I like it.</p>Camalaio_ on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleCamalaio_urn:uuid:926e7847-705b-662f-e771-5038d5eda0542013-04-08T13:38:28-06:00<p>A bit late on the reply, but common household hot water tanks hold water around 60C (140F). Basically all that is needed hot tap water that isn&rsquo;t super hard, and a brush wouldn&rsquo;t hurt. Deposits from hard water <em>could</em> cause problems, but unlikely for hobby use.</p>TD Gonzales on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleTD Gonzalesurn:uuid:6922caf8-3ac2-8751-56c0-9bf4c608de122012-10-15T14:20:11-06:00<p>I have had the same problem with this stuff. I&rsquo;m new to soldering and it feels weird to shove a board under a faucet and scrub it with a toothbrush. Although for finer more detailed stuff stick with rubbing alcohol.</p>HelloTechie on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleHelloTechieurn:uuid:1bfb8d34-9d6d-1ae9-3be0-ae9d321899f22012-07-10T16:15:42-06:00<p>Thanks for your feedback and product suggestion. I will pass along to our main product research person!</p>Electrical Juggernaut on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleElectrical Juggernauturn:uuid:e9a9c8ad-ac29-062d-d540-dc90290761152012-07-09T20:25:50-06:00<p>Having used this one, I prefer <a href="http://www.chemtronics.com/products/product.asp?r=1&amp;m=2&amp;id=27" rel="nofollow" >this one</a>, specifically the no clean version. I have tested it up to 900 MHz and up to 100v, it has no noticeable effects of capacitance or conductivity. It&rsquo;s great because you don&rsquo;t have to worry about corrosion from leftover flux under BGA or other surface mount chips. Any chance you could stock some?</p>nmorisod on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water Solublenmorisodurn:uuid:11351581-5ea5-f5a2-2538-442c210edb7f2012-06-01T02:26:12-06:00<p>I&rsquo;ve tried this flux and it&rsquo;s working well.</p>
<p>But effectively a big warning if you don&rsquo;t clean the flux after using it, because it is more conductive that you might think.</p>
<p>I&rsquo;ve used this to transplant a super gameboy cpu to a gameboy and it was not working after the transplant. i&rsquo;ve seen like a electrolysis between cpu pins (SMT) when power was applied. anfter cleaning the board everything was working fine ..</p>mpechner on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water Solublempechnerurn:uuid:5a66bfba-e609-573c-5a03-3ff053ecae4b2012-02-10T01:37:04-07:00<p>When ever I want to try a new surface mount technique I use this kit:
http://www.electronickitsbychaneyelectronics.com/DELUXE-SMD-LEARN-TO-SOLDER/productinfo/C6719/</p>
<p>It has practice parts and a red greed led blinker using a 555.</p>
<p>I used the flux pen to solder this kit. I licked it. It stayed wet long enough to do a few parts.
It washed off easily. I used the dedicted toothbrush to scrub the board. Then the heat gun to dry and evaporate the water.</p>
<p>I do prefer water based flux. No chemicals required to clean. And it does not become a sticky as the no-clean stuff.</p>MattCF on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleMattCFurn:uuid:8e4bb0e9-bccd-ec8a-bf71-311976224e6a2011-04-28T22:16:43-06:00<p>nice little flux pen very easy to use, to clean just use Rubbing Alchol (I use that stuff for everything but in a well ventaled area but if you are using flux you are allready going to be in one so I guess you are okay)</p>JBeale1 on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleJBeale1urn:uuid:6df89693-866b-316a-88f6-ab89ea7e22342010-11-07T22:30:47-07:00<p>Kester&rsquo;s 2331-ZX data sheet says cleaning is recommended, as below. So are people actually washing their boards with DI water at 140 F ? Just curious.<br/>
&ldquo;&hellip;It is not recommended to use high mineral content tap water. Otherwise, tap, deionized or softened water may be used for cleaning. The optimum water temperature is 54-66?C (130-150?F), although lower temperatures may be sufficient.&rdquo;</p>ScottH on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleScottHurn:uuid:ccfbfcbc-b67e-d434-9816-fb8d1ba666532010-10-31T11:07:03-06:00<p>This stuff is more conductive that you might think. I was working on a high-gain instrumentation amp circuit prototype on a board with no solder mask and the the resistance between adjacent traces was a megaohm or less!<br/>
That&rsquo;s many microamps of leakage in the circuit and it drove my circuit to the rails and caused all sorts of oddball behavior. A solder mask would have reduced the interaction area between the traces and the flux, but the it still would have caused problems.<br/>
If your circuit will function with megaohm resistors sprinkled all over you may not have to clean before you test, but you should.<br/>
Also, the stuff is corrosive and will cause problems over time.</p>RobertC. on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleRobertC.urn:uuid:af2b39ad-7ee2-dd3e-1483-451e1c64a39a2010-05-04T08:25:05-06:00<p>It&rsquo;s barely conductive. But, it is corrosive. It&rsquo;s best to clean off any flux residue with alcohol when you&rsquo;re done.</p>SteveL on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleSteveLurn:uuid:aec95318-98f6-cc3d-8ffb-bb119e7c1aa22010-05-03T17:27:41-06:00<p>Is the solder flux conductive??</p>aqua_scummm on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water Solubleaqua_scummmurn:uuid:a7d41152-419a-7929-8d8d-ba9661831b522010-03-09T21:12:12-07:00<p>This is the best way to improve your solder joints. This stuff works great, very good flow, easy to clean, and easy to apply. Made more of an improvement in my solder joints than a temperature controlled iron or anything else in my toolkit.</p>Asuraku on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water SolubleAsurakuurn:uuid:73472061-cde3-42cf-dbb6-6fad0df25bf72009-12-20T13:28:16-07:00<p>Always clean your boards! I don&rsquo;t know if it&rsquo;s because I&rsquo;m IPC certified for class III PTH as well SMT, but even with a Low flux, corrosion can occur. Just make sure you clean off a board with rubbing alcohol and some non-fibrous tissues (Kimwipes are really good). And it helps to use a flux brush (commonly sold at hardware stores for applying acid based fluxes for copper pipes) to scrub with the alcohol. And note that the alcohol doesn&rsquo;t act as a solvent, it just removes the flux from the board and mixes with with the alcohol. Then use the Kimwipes to clean it up.<br/>
Happy soldering!</p>jolshefsky on TOL-08967 - Liquid Flux Pen - Water Solublejolshefskyurn:uuid:f7a15f14-6721-e176-d391-7cdcdb845c9e2009-09-23T22:43:43-06:00<p>I tried several varieties of Kester flux and this one is by far the best. It stays liquid for a long time in the tube, it&rsquo;s easy to dispense, and it is an excellent wetting agent for liquid solder (especially the finicky lead-free stuff I&rsquo;m using).<br/>
Its only disadvantage is that it does conduct electricity (a little) when dry, so you really should wash your boards afterward. Well, probably not &hellip; except if you&rsquo;re soldering triacs for use on line voltage because otherwise pretty sparks will result.</p>